


The Coffee Shop

by Larentina



Category: Shame (2011)
Genre: F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Innuendo, References to Addiction, References to Drugs, Slow Build, bad language
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-23
Updated: 2014-10-23
Packaged: 2018-02-22 08:38:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2501480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Larentina/pseuds/Larentina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Picking up where the film left off, Brandon struggles with beating his addiction in the attempt to find meaningful connection with another person.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Coffee Shop

* * *

He doesn't follow her.

Out of the train, up the short flight of stairs and straight into the first coffee shop he sees, ordering something. He can't even focus on what. Cappuccino, as it turns out. All he can think about is the woman on the train, the promise in her eyes.

The booths are all full, a pretty girl in the corner one not so subtly watching him from under her eyelashes. He takes the one furthest from her, but the layout of the shop means she won't be out of his sight line.

She's got the look of a college student, all geek chic with thick rim glasses, soft brunette curls and a rack that other women would kill for, tucked away under that sensible green jersey. Younger than him, but that never stopped him befo-

"Honey, put your tongue in. Drooling on the table just ain't gonna do it for nobody."

He snaps to attention, turning to his previously neglected booth partner.

Business suit, once fine but now old and worn. Bare face, devoid of makeup, crumbs caught in the folds of her sleeves, frown lines and dull, dark blonde hair. Her face holds an expression that would make you think it's the wrong side of noon on the day the whole world decided to take a shit in her kettle and she just made herself coffee without realizing.

"Think I preferred your hormonal teenager seeing his first pretty girl face to your disgusted face. Seriously. Drink your fucking coffee and get out of my booth."

"Is your name on it?" He wants to smack his face on the table as soon as it passes his lips, because it's just so-

"I take back the teenager. I'm sharing air with a pretentious coffee drinking toddler."

He grits his teeth and sips at the scalding coffee, watching what she's doing and kidding himself that he's not just trying to avoid looking at the pretty girl.

His table partner rests her elbow on the edge of the wood, fingers gripping tightly into the roots at the front of her hair as her mouth moves frantically, counting. Her napkin is scrawled all over with figures, dates here and there. After a minute or so she crumples the napkin and throws it into her empty coffee mug. She slump back in her seat, glaring at the traffic outside and he feels the need to say something, because that's who he is. He's charming Brandon Sullivan.

"What is it for you, drugs? Alcohol?" she says, absently. So much so that he thinks she is talking to herself until she turns to look directly at him "Well?"

"Excuse me?"

"Did I fucking stutter? What's your fix?"

He can't speak. How did she know? How can he say- no, how can she ask?

She huffs and throws up her hands, leaning forward and reaching for her purse. "I'm not your shrink, so get talking because the mysterious, too shy for the pry act really is doing nothing for me."

"Sex." There it is, in the open before his brain has quite caught up to the fact that the confession is cheerfully waving goodbye and leaping off his tongue.

"Oh right."

And she gets up and leaves, without so much as blinking. He's doing plenty for the both of them, sitting there making like a goldfish while she makes her way out into the street.

It's a long walk back to his apartment from the coffee shop. He'd got off at the wrong stop during his mild panic attack after deciding to not follow the woman on the train. He spends the time wondering at how light he feels, like telling just one person his dirty secret has made things better.

* * *

He goes back the next day, since he has compassionate leave from work anyway, but she isn't there. The college girl is though.

Her name is Susie and damn is she good with her mouth.

* * *

It becomes a part of his routine to get off the train those extra few stops early, walk past the coffee shop.

She's never there again, though sometimes he sees Susie and is forced to quicken his pace when she sees him going past, pretend he hasn't seen her.

He's slept with seven different women since her.

* * *

One day it's raining. Absolutely pissing it down. So he doesn't bother looking into the windows, just heads straight into the shop and orders. He's sitting down in the furthest booth from Susie and feeling the beginnings of deja vu when she speaks.

"Nothing gets my jollies off like chatting with a sex addict, but you know there are free booths."

He glances sideways but he's already recognised the rough Brooklyn accent. She's sopping wet, clearly having been one of the unlucky bastards caught without an umbrella. The suit is gone, in it's place a sodden hoody and jeans. There's a stack of pulpy, waterlogged leaflets on the table that she seems to have been attempting to separate. There are three that she's managed and they're all scrunched up like used tissues.

"Yeah, I reckon I'm sacked. Only been handing these out a few days, so the guy is gonna be hopping mad when he sees they're all ruined. Think I handed out like two, tops." There's no moroseness, or even resignation as she notices him looking. She's so..blasé about it. If he lost his job he'd probably be googling tall buildings to jump off.

"Sorry." he says and she briefly acknowledges his words with a shrug.

"You were wearing a suit before." he lamely attempts to start conversation and she rolls her eyes.

"If you want to play doctor phil, cut the small talk and go ahead. I have nowhere better to be and the longer I stay out of that-" she jerked her thumb towards the downpour outside "-the better."

"Last week my sister tried to kill herself. She's staying with me now and I've no idea what to do with her."

"Get her a goddamn shrink, you look rich enough. Or do this thing where you talk to her. Bout her feeling and shit. Get all family bonding or whatever."

She's looking down into her empty mug slightly mournfully and he remembers she's just lost her job.

"What coffee do you like?"

"Black, sugary enough to induce coma. Not bought for me by a self confessed crazy man, so don't even think of waving the acne ridden waiter over."

"Has anyone ever told you how charming you are?"

"Many lying bastards have, actually. So how often do you have sex then?"

He chokes on the cappuccino, swallows thickly around a suddenly sore throat. "Bit direct."

"Oh sorry. How many times per day do you and a woman of your choice have...coitus?"

"Now you sound like a doctor."

"Shenanigans?" she suggested, totally deadpan. "'Make love?'" she air quoted, looking repulsed by the expression and he had to agree with her.

"Let's just call it sex."

"Well that is what it's called." she muttered, flicking her spoon. Her nails were scuffed and dirty.

"I don't know. Don't count. But I think I get off maybe five times, then again if I find someone for the night." he always did. He was single-minded like that.

She whistled, breaking out into small chuckles. "Surprised it hasn't fallen off. Must chafe like a bitch though."

"How did you know?"

"Well its common sense if you're permanently-"

"Not that. How did you know I was a...an addict?"

"Oh. Spent plenty of time around people like that. You seemed a bit too sane for a methhead though."

He laughed at that, long and too hard. Because she thought him too sane for something.

* * *

Fridays becomes coffee shop day with Melissa. Although that's not her name, as she unflinchingly told him. It's just something he can call her. He tells her his name is Charlie. It's the first thing that entered his head.

He tells her about his recovering sister. His addiction. His shame. That Sissy knows now, but neither of them talk. She doesn't ask him about his issues around sex and he doesn't ask about her suicide attempt. They just drift around the apartment like silent ghosts, watch the occasional film or tv show together until they came across one with a sex scene. It wasn't graphic, but her head whipped around to scrutinize him as if expecting to see him whip out his dick then and there. He found himself getting up to go jogging, fuming. They stopped watching things together after that.

He lays all this at Melissa's feet and shockingly, her advice isn't terrible. Because it's nonexistent. Normally she commiserates, or tells him he's being an ass, or else makes a sassy comment. But she never tells him what to do.

He learns next to nothing about her, because whenever the conversation veers that way she corrects it immediately, bringing the subject back to him and telling him this isn't a fucking show and tell, turns will not be taken no I don't want another coffee.

She always seems to be working some new, crappy job for minimum wage. Which doesn't fit with her vocabulary, which when she isn't swearing at him is quite impressive and refined. She's educated, that much is sure from the remnants of a posher lilt to her accent when she's calm and the way she articulates some of her deeper thoughts.

Then one week she drops an unintentional bombshell in the form of her phone ringing. She whips it out and he laughs because it's a goddamn flip phone from perhaps 2005, battered as hell and so...Melissa.

"Yes? Okay, I see. Yes I'll be there."

She clicks it shut and stands, brushing some of the tangle out of her hair with her fingers.

"Have to go, my daughter is sick. Next week, yeah?"

She's busy with her bag as she all but sprints for the door, not seeing him sitting there frozen.

Daughter?

* * *

He is early the next week and spends the spare moments tapping fretfully on the tabletop with a quarter. It's a two four rhythm. He's hyper aware of the condensation dripping down the side of his coffee cup, Susie giving him that half angry, half lustful glare from across the cafe. She hasn't yet approached him, despite being clearly bitter about his lack of wanting to have a relationship with her.

Except when he next looks up towards the door, Susie's suddenly there. His hand fumbles the handle of his cup, slopping coffee over the edges so that it pools on the table.

"So what's the deal? You with her?"

"Who?" he already knows who she's asking about.

"The woman you're always meeting here. Shitty dress sense, clearly unemployed-"

"Yet with better manners than you, so go figure. While you're at it, lose the hipster glasses. You don't need them, you're wearing them for fashion. Or 'cause you wanna look smarter. Compensating?"

Susie gaped at Melissa's sudden arrival, stuttering out half an apology before her face hardened and she clamped her jaw shut. Her shoes slapped loudly on the tiles and the glass in the door rattled as she slammed it shut behind her.

Melissa slid into her usual seat with a deep groan, massaging her temples. "Go get me a cup of the darkest, strongest thing they have. I want it strong enough to tar my insides for the next thirty years, alright?"

"Bad day?"

"Bad life, but who the fuck cares? Now. You, coffee, bring."

He fetches her usual and she proceeds to dump nearly four sachets of sugar into it.

"So, fuck anyone interesting this week?"

"I wouldn't know. They don't usually talk much."

"Hmm. Conversation is a little limited if the only words you're saying are 'yes' and 'harder'."

"It's normally just screaming and moaning actually."

She barked out a laugh. "You're kinkier than I thought if you're into that shit."

"What- oh no, god. Power play can be...but no, someone asks me to hit them and I'm pulling out-"

"Oh Christ that's funny." she chortled, fully enjoying a joke at his expense. "You're blushing. You haven't done that since we first talked about sex- ah there it is again."

"So, did you find a new job." he said, irritably picking up his mug and hiding his face behind it as he took a sip.

"Nope and I may soon seriously consider prostitution. Why, interested?" she spread her arms wide and performed a mocking wiggle that caused her breasts to bounce against her top. "Nah, but don't change the subject. Tell me about your sex."

"Tell me about your daughter." he shot back, feeling cornered and instinctively pushing back.

"She's the cutest damn thing on this world, my reason to be, my one bright fucking light, now tell me about your sexscapades. I wish to live vicariously through you for a bit."

"You're not...with anybody?"

"Unless my hand has developed a consciousness of it's own, hell no."

"For...how long?"

"Eeh...three years?"

He spat out his coffee.

* * *

That evening, he was jogging through the streets with his music pounding in his ears. He hadn't been able to get his mind off his conversation with Melissa, so much so that he'd not even picked anyone up today. He always could though and the thought appealed, but first he wanted to try and figure out what he thought about what he'd learned.

"Well you don't have to act so shocked. You seriously think I have time for casual anything?"

"You meet me every week."

"That's cause you clearly need help and you're either too poor or too proud to get a proper shrink. Going by the rolex, I'm saying proud."

"I don't need-"

"You have no close friends; your work colleagues don't count because the most you ever do is go out for the occasional drink. Your sister is so estranged it's like you are roommates, not related. She's tried to kill herself and you can't even talk to her about it. You had a breakdown and you can't even accept it. You're lonely, you're unable to appreciate what you have in life, in fact you're barely alive at all. You just go through the motions and find pleasure in the only place you can-"

"Stop."

"No. You're existing Charlie not living."

It was the fake name that had done it. He'd stormed out, leaving her sitting there stunned.

Now he felt...disturbed. Like she'd cut him open and laid him bare, diagnosed his problem in minute detail before stitching him up and expecting him to just cope. He was splitting at the seams. He wanted-

He wanted to be comforted. He wanted to cry and have someone tell him it would be okay. He had never had anyone do that since his mother when he was very young.

He staggered home, muscles sore from running nearly twice as long as usual. Cissy was asleep on the couch with a book half held in her hand. She'd clearly been waiting up but had fallen asleep.

He collected the book, threw a cover over her and went to bed.

He took a day off work the next day, bracing himself as he sat down at the breakfast table. Cissy looked up expectantly.

"I think we should talk.

* * *

He feels different. Like it is another man that sits down in that same coffee shop in that same booth waiting for the same woman. It's another note in a familiar melody. Discordantly beautiful.

"I wasn't sure you'd be here."

Melissa sits down opposite him, taking off a baseball cap and smoothing out her hair. She looks exhausted.

He holds out his hand. "Brandon Sullivan."

She considers the proffered hand before slowly placing her hand in his. The digits are slender, fragile but firm. "Emily Davis."

They shake and in that moment it honestly feels like the most significant event of his life.

Then Melissa, or rather Emily, breaks it by wiggling her fingers.

"You gonna get down on one knee or something? Seriously, let go of my damn hand, creeper."

He withdraws it quickly, not so subtly rubbing it on his jacket. She snorts.

"Charming, Brandon Sullivan. Just charming."

* * *

He goes jogging with Cissy now, every night. She whines and whinges and they tease each other all the way around the block. It's surprisingly fun.

They don't understand each other, not yet. That would take so much more than just one heartfelt conversation. But they accept each other. For now, it is more than enough.

"Who's Melissa?" She asks tentatively.

His first reaction is defensive. Is she spying on him? Following him? Nobody knows, it's his secret-

"You were talking in your sleep." She hurriedly adds. "You said her name. Just that, nothing else."

He didn't remember most of his dreams, even those that had been vivid at the time. He shrugs it off.

"She's a friend, no one special."

He's getting better at not covering up the truth. At least one half of that sentence is true.

* * *

When he reaches the coffee shop one day, it's unexpectedly closed. Something about a refit, they'll be closed for several weeks.

"Wherever will we get crappy coffee until then?" a wry voice says at his shoulder. Emily squints up at him. "Jesus you're tall. You look shorter when you're sitting."

"Most people do." He quips and she smirks, folding her hands into her pockets and turning away from the closed door.

"Well, looks like we're taking our custom elsewhere. Come along, trust fund. Let's get you some real coffee..."

She takes him to a trailer cafe that sells grease in the shape of hotdogs and burgers. The man there brightens like a 100 Watt bulb.

"Hey Max. Two coffees, one burger for me too. I'm famished."

"How's little Rosie?"

"Just fine. She writes her own name now. Signs all her pictures now, because that's what proper artists do."

The man winks. "Give her a kiss from Uncle Max, eh?"

"I will."

She pays and max watches them wander off, sizing Brandon up rather blatantly before turning to his next customer.

"Here." Emily huffs and he tears his eyes away from the man in the trailer, taking the styrofoam cup gingerly in his gloved hands. Winter isn't quite done with them yet, though the season had been just beginning when he first met Emily. How long ago was that now? God was it three months ago? Or was it really four?

"How long have we been meeting up every Friday?"

She shrugs, taking a sip of her coffee and wincing when it scalds her. "Four months? Since mid November. It's March now, so yeah. Four months." She winked at him. "It's 'cause I'm irresistibly charming, obviously."

The situation defuses as he laughs easily, remembering the other thing he'd realised. "Your daughter's name is Rosie?"

She smiled, fondness softening her for the first time in all these four months. "Rose. I call her Rosie though."

"What's she like?"

Her eyes light up brighter than diamonds. Prettier, too.

* * *

He's still thinking about that look in her eyes hours later as he touches himself listlessly. He hasn't been with anyone in over a week. Just his hand. It's almost unheard of. But he's just so busy these days between jogging with Cissy and coffee with Mel- Emily. It's still hard to remember her real name. He still calls her Melissa out loud a lot of the time and in his head.

That look in her eyes. For the first time he saw something that wasn't anger, or sarcasm or resigned in her. He saw fight, happiness, pride. Love.

It was a good look on her. A smile that wasn't wry, a laugh that wasn't hollow. She could even look pretty, if she smiled more often.

* * *

Somehow the coffee walks become their new thing, even when the cafe reopens. The weather is getting ever milder, the flowers in all the parks beginning to bud.

"Why are you always between jobs?" He asks, one day.

"Usually I get fired for lateness. Rose's minder is late, or my other job runs over."

"You work two jobs?"

She snorted "Welcome to how the other half live Brandon. Yeah, I work two jobs most of the time, until I get fired from one."

Did you go to college?"

She laughed even harder. "Yeah. Much good it did me. Minored in French and majored in accounting."

A respectable, useful degree. Why was she scraping around for jobs? She smiled enigmatically at his confusion, eyes hard and distant.

"So. How often you holding your sausage hostage these days?"

He chokes on his coffee for what feels like the hundredth time and she laughs long and hard at his expense. He smiles and wipes his mouth, giving her a gentle shove in the side. She's so skinny that she goes flying, still laughing as she staggers on, regaining her footing.

"No, but really. You must go through so much lube. Do they roll it up to your house in a tanker? Or does it get delivered in small but regular quantities? Like milk bottles. A daily lube delivery." She was putting herself in stitches at the thought, face contorting with laughter.

He smiled and shook his head at her. "You really have the worst brain to mouth filter of anyone I've ever met."

"Ahh, but that Brandon, is why you love me." She nudged him, draining her cup and jogging ahead to the bin to toss it away. By then he'd schooled his expression back to neutral.

"Anyway. Next Friday is a no go. My new job wants me working every afternoon but Sunday."

"Okay. Same time Sunday then?"

"I can't. I have Rosie, remember?"

"What about the Friday after?" he sounds needy and he hates it. But as soon as she said there would be no meeting, a lead weight settled in his stomach. 

"Oh don't start sobbing on me already; I'll probably have lost the job by then. Now would you give me your phone already? I'm giving you my number. Until we can meet up again, you can use that to get your fix of my dulcet tones. I have next to no credit most of the time though, so don't be expecting me to be ringing you up, trust fund boy."

* * *

Next Friday, he is indecisive all day about whether to call her. Not at the usual time, she'd be working. After that? But what if she was eating dinner?

He goes out to a bar, intent on picking someone up, but winds up staring sullenly at his phone.

"Woman trouble?" The bartender says before quickly walking away when Brandon glares him into next week.

* * *

Next morning, freshly showered and shaved after a short jog, he picks up the phone.

The dial tone is cheerful in his ear, stretching on and on.

"Hullo?" The bleary voice on the other end says. "Whosis?"

"Brandon? Are you-"

There's a long groan on the other end. "Asshole. It's 8am. Why couldn't you have waited another hour or two?"

"I thought you'd be working then?"

"Eurgh. Yeah. I would be. Fine. So, honey, how was your week?" she put on a airy housewife impression and he relaxed. She wasn't upset.

"Fine. Might be getting promoted. Cissy is finally going back to her own place. I'll have the flat to myself."

"Ooh make me insatiably jealous, why don't you?"

"How's your new job?"

"Fine, if you like getting regularly groped by drunks. Hey maybe you should come work here?"

"Funny." He said, leaning back further against the counter. "But do they bother you?"

"Of course. But I can hardly give them a punch in the face now can I?"

"I suppose not."

"Still, I wish I could." on the other side of the phone she yawns and sheets rustle. He coughs, unexpectedly touched by the image of her in bed. Did she wear pyjamas? Underwear? Nothing..?

He bit his lip, managing to calm himself and force out an excuse to get off the phone.

"You should get some more sleep. I'll ring later?"

"Yeah sure." Her reply is tired and there's another long yawn. "Talk to you later, Brandon."

The phone clicks; she is as abrupt as ever. No nonsense with her about lengthy goodbyes and who is hanging up. He likes that.

He likes the mental image of her sleepy and pliant in bed even more, which scares him.

* * *

He rings or texts her most days now. Just little chats about their day, no more than ten minutes. Except that time where she got into a rant about modern Disney movies. That had gone on at least twenty minutes alone. He'd heard her daughter playing in the background.

She often texts him under the bar, mainly about her patrons. They're always funny, even without pictures. She has a way with words, of describing things.

Cissy has noticed the calls, but doesn't comment until the day she leaves. At the station, she unexpectedly throws her arms around him and says she hopes it works out for him. He hadn't the heart to explain that he and Emily weren't in a relationship.

He misses his sister, unexpectedly. He'd got used to her presence in the mornings, on jogs. Maybe that's why he rings Emily so much. He wants to avoid filling the void Cissy has left with sex, so instead he fills it with Emily. She's doing fine in her new evening job, serving drinks in some local bar. She never gives him the name, but he can tell she hates it there. They always talk every evening after she gets in, around midnight. He stays up surfing the Internet until then, idly flicking through his favourite porn sites. 

"What do you even do in your job? Advertising executive, right?"

"Right. I oversee advertising campaigns, liase between company and client-"

"God no wonder you need to get laid so badly." She yawned in a rush of static. "Sounds riveting."

"Says the woman who studied accounting."

"Mmm touché mon ami. D'accord...ah hell."

"What?"

"Nothing, nothing." There's the sound of her crossing something out violent and huffing out a sigh. "Just did my accounts, been avoiding them for over a week. News flash; I'm poor."

"How poor?" He regrets the question as soon as he asks it, knowing she is proud. He couldn't count on all his fingers and toes the amount of times she's waived off his attempts to pay for her coffee and counted out the change coin by coin. She always tips, even though she so clearly can't afford to.

She sighs on the other side and he can hear feet padding across wooden floors. "Poorer than Bill Gates, Richer than a street beggar." There is the sound of mattress springs as she gets into bed, sheets rustling. "Somewhat nearer the latter though. That's all the clue you're getting."

He knows better than to go against that warning, or worse apologise. So he changes the subject and soon forgets entirely.

* * *

"Can we have four beers and a-" He finishes his turn and draws up short as he is faced with Emily, whose face is neutral and unsurprised.

"Four beers and a...?"

"Vodka and coke." He finishes weakly before David claps him on the shoulder, turning him back around as Emily flits around gathering glasses and organising everything.

"-But let's not forget who we owe this to! The man of the hour, Brandon Sullivan!"

He smiles and tries to turn back around, but David swoops past and grabs the drinks, handing them out to their small group. They'd closed the deal on a successful campaign earlier, a big one for the company. Brandon had overseen it all.

He forced a smile, allowing himself to be shepherded towards a table. David's talking about something, but all he can focus on is that he can't see Emily.

"Someone meeting you here, Brandon?" Peter asks, laughing before he takes a sip of his beer. Peter's on the creative team. He's the idea guy.

"No...just. Thought I saw someone I recognised."

His best option is to play it cool, be the last to leave so he can seek out Emily. The only other excuse would be-

He drains his glass, standing. "I'm going to get another. David?"

His friend raises an eyebrow at his sudden uncharacteristic desire to get drunk. Then he shrugs and drains his own glass. "Sure. If you're buying."

He wanders up to the bar, placing the glasses down with a dual clunk. Emily looks up, her eyes widening slightly.

"Same again." He says, smiling at her. She doesn't return it, getting straight to work and putting the refilled glasses back in front of him.

"Not now." Is all she mutters, before turning to wipe down some glasses.

He can't exactly stand there any longer without people wondering what he's doing, so he grit his teeth and picks up the glasses, heading back to his workmates.

* * *

At some point after the fifth? Fourth? Seventh...? At some point, he fell into haziness. Every time he went up to the bar, she refused to talk to him. Treated him like a total stranger. He was only very dimly aware of David offering to share a cab and him waving him off, saying he wanted to stay. He want going until she talked to him. David didn't know who she was and was too drunk himself to be insistent.

"You're unfucking believable, you know that Sullivan?" a voice hissed near his ear. Hands pushed him, trying to get him in a seated position. When did he lie down?

"You okay locking up Em?"

"Yeah, fine. Just getting this ass into a cab."

"You know him?"

"Unfortunately. Knew him in school, wouldn't say we were exactly friendly, but we know each other."

"Well, as drunks go he's pretty harmless. No mess and nothing broken. Just get him out of here and tell him to lay off it next time, the lightweight."

"Alright. Will do. Have a good weekend."

"You too, Emily. Stay safe."

There was the sound of a door closing and suddenly the hands retreated. Only to come back, striking him all over his chest.

"Get. Up."

A hand slapped his cheek lightly and he hauled himself up- or down. The world tilted and he hit the floor hard, chin throbbing.

Somewhere above him, Emily was busting a gut laughing.

* * *

Waking up was painful. He had a churning in his gut, a sandpaper tongue, a head like jello and a strange stabbing pain in his face.

"Are you dead?" A voice whispered and the stabbing came again, harder. Tiny fingers were poking him in the face. "Hey."

A poke to his eye was the final straw and he opened them, hissing at the brightness of the room.

He was bundled on a sofa in a dingy room, walls a nasty greyish once blue colour. The little girl giggled and even though it hurt his head, the noise was heartwarming.

"You're awake."

"Yes." He managed.

"I'm Rosie."

He looked around with renewed interest, making the effort to sit up as details of last night came back to him he remembered being dragged into a cab, but nothing after that. Emily must have brought him to her place. Which made this her daughter. 

The child was studying him raptly and didn't seem to mind his sudden assessment of her features. Yes, there was a great resemblance. She was much better fed than her mother though, with bright eyes and hair that was thick and healthy, bones not sticking out too far under her skin. He jolted as he compared her to Emily and suddenly realised just how thin and drawn his friend was. Things surely couldn't be that bad though, could they?

"Are you sick?"

"No. Well, a little."

"Do you want some of mommy's pills?"

Figuring they'd be aspirin or similar, he nodded. Sure enough, she trotted off and dragged a chair up to clamber onto the counter and reach the top cupboard. She was so tiny she had to stand on it to reach the top shelf.

"Careful." He slurred, hanging his head between his legs.

"I am."

She came trundling back over and handed him the box. Paracetamol. It would do.

He swallowed them dry and groaned as she hopped up onto the sofa beside him. She jostled him and with his head hurting so much she felt like a baby elephant not a child.

"What's your name?"

"Brandon."

"Hi."

"Hello."

Silence reigned for a short while. Then;

"Do you like scrabble?"

* * *

"It isn't a word."

"Xi is a word! The dictionary said so."

"Really? Then what does it mean."

"I don't know. Mommy said it was Greek."

"I think she may have been-"

"It's the fourteenth letter of the Greek alphabet." Emily's voice unexpectedly yawned. She was standing in the open archway between the bedroom and the living room. "My brother used to always use it to beat me at Christmas. It counts, Brandon."

"So it's eight. Plus one. Niiine. Then it's on a red one. Triple word."

"That's-"

"Twenty seven." she finished promptly and he was once again taken aback. She'd shown an uncanny knack with numbers and words in the hour or so they'd been playing.

"Yes. It is."

Emily padded past to the kitchen and he discretely watched her. She slept in a t shirt and baggy pair of checked blue pyjama bottoms. Her feet were pale and bare, nails unpainted.

"Have you had breakf- oh."

"No milk. It's your turn." Rosie added, kicking her feet where they were sticking up in the air. Brandon smiled and looked at his letters.

"Yeah, I meant to get some on my way back last night. Huh. Exit." Emily said, tapping Brandon's shoulder. He nodded, put the 'E' and 'T' to either side of the Xi and stood up.

"Where's your nearest store? I'll run there and get some food. You take over here."

"Well sure...here I'll get my purse-"

"No need, it's my fault you don't have it anyway."

She narrowed her eyes. "Fine. But just milk, okay?"

"Sure, just milk." He lied.

* * *

"What. The. Hell." She spat, glaring at his bags upon bags full of groceries. Rosie appeared beside her in the doorway, eyes lighting up.

"Food! What did you get? Are those biscuits? Did you get any-"

"Let me carry them in and you can look at everything, okay?"

"Okay, okay!" she stormed out of the way, tugging Emily with her. The woman didn't take her furious eyes off of Brandon for a second, walking backwards just to do so.

He was expecting anger, but he didn't expect the stinging slap she delivered to his face as soon as she'd hauled him into the bathroom and closed the door.

"How dare you. How fucking- is this some sort of game to you? What, you decided you want to play happy families now? Find your redemption elsewhere. I will not have you near her, getting her hopes up only to move on when you lose interest. Get this straight, Brandon. We are not friends. We are passing ships. You stay out of my life-"

"Once a day." He had already made his decision earlier, when he had seen the bareness of the room. The one bed the two shared, the one old board game, the next to empty fridge and dusty unused cupboards.

"What?"

"That's how often, now. When we met it was five times or more. I chat to Cissy most days now, in the evening. I return her calls. I talk to you. I go swimming and jogging, I take up invites to the pub instead of brushing them off to go home and hire a prostitute."

"Keep your voice down!" Emily hissed, eyes widening dangerously. "I don't want her hearing words like that!"

"But you're fine with her not eating a proper meal? With her not even having her own bed-"

"Get out." She said, calmly and he faltered.

"What-"

"Leave. Right now."

She opened the bathroom door, stepping out and walking away.

"Rosie? Cher? Come say goodbye to Brandon. He's leaving now."

"Already? Can he come over again?"

"No, angel. He lives a bit too far away."

Brandon swallowed, the room narrowing around him. Was she saying what he thought she was? Was she cutting him loose? After all this time, just when he was starting to...

To care. To want to connect.

His mouth was too dry. Or was it the air that was so damn dry, that made it impossible to breathe? He took in quick shallow breaths, trying to relax. He needs, he needs - he has to make her see.

Emily comes back into the bathroom, hard faced and unyielding. He throws herself at her without thought, arms clutching, grabbing, crushing. Her breath stutters and becomes a gasp; he is grinding her fine slender bones together in the strength of his embrace.

And the only word that suave, charming Brandon Sullivan can find is a desperate entreaty. "Please."

Slowly, her hands come up to scrape through his hair. He is shaking, waiting tensely for her to say something, anything.

"Rose's father was an addict." She said mildly, detachedly. Like a comment on the weather. "His cravings were a little more...pharmaceutical...than yours. Like I said to you, once. I know addicts. They lie, they deny and they manipulate."

She pulled away, firmly looking him square in the eyes. "I will never be anything more to you than a friend."

He nods; that is enough, more than enough.

"But if I ever think you're bad for her, you're gone. Understand? She comes before anything."

"Even your pride?" he murmurs, belatedly fearing he'd gone too far as her eyes drift over his shoulder.

"Yes." She concedes quietly, after well over a minute has passed. Then looks back up, finger pressing into his chest as the fire in her eyes returns. "But don't you dare take that as license to treat us as a charity case."

"Okay." He agreed and she nodded. His arms were still around her. He should probably move them. But she was just staring at him with her wide eyes. The twin dilated pupils were sucking him in, drawing him closer.

Then Rose burst into the room, squealing and clutching a bright blue packet. "You got me Oreos?!"

* * *

So now he had a new routine. On friday he picks up Rose from her minder after work and stays overnight on the cramped and lumpy sofa to spend saturdays at Emily's. Playing scrabble in a sprawled out group on the threadbare carpet, or visiting the community library and checking out more books (which he invariably ended up carrying for rose despite her mothers grumbling). In good weather, they took her to the playground. Life was simple, good. Sometimes he bought them takeaways in the evening or else Emily cooked badly and then he ordered them takeaway anyway.

Emily had put on weight, her figure had filled out, her cheeks gained colour. But she is still distant, wary, sarcastic. She tones it down in rose's hearing and never, ever swears in front of her daughter. The shocking cessation of vulgarity alone makes her softer, or maybe she is just acclimatising to his obstinate presence in her life.

And one day when she walks into the living room, yawning and scratching at the back of her head, rustling tangled bed hair, he was hit with the stomach dropping realisation that he just might love her.

**Author's Note:**

> I actually started this immediately after watching shame, just because i felt so sorry for Brandon. There will be another part, if people are interested, though it could also be left here to your imagination.


End file.
